BI for Cloud Computing

With enhanced capabilities for cloud computing, leading Business intelligence (BI) firm Yellowfin has launched version 4.1 of its flagship Yellowfin product suite.

Yellowfin, with it 100% browser based interface, has always been able to be deployed via the cloud; however, Yellowfin 4.1 offers enhanced scalability with improved clustering administration allowing for far larger and complex deployments. For example by using Amazon's Elastic Compute Cloud web service as the backbone.

Glen rabie, CEO of Yellowfin says “Popular applications for cloud deployment include software-as-a-service applications such as CRM, expense management, human resources, and Web analytics. But now we’re seeing a sudden burst of activity around business intelligence. This makes sense, since BI software shares characteristics with the aforementioned apps that make it right for cloud computing.”

"Cloud deployments address the problem of long and complex deployments. With Yellowfin’s browser based graphical configuration environment we are able to host the entire solution in the cloud. So other than making a connection to the company's business systems, there is very little burden on the IT staff or their budget," Rabie says.

The benefits of deploying Yellowfin in the cloud have been proven by Base2, who use Yellowfin to track real time performance metrics for field management services. "In the past you had to buy and manage physical servers to deploy Yellowfin, but now you can have Yellowfin running within 15 minutes," said Arthur Marinis of Base2 a Yellowfin partner.
Apart from faster time-to-value, Maris noted that the on-demand model allows Base2’s customers to scale capacity on the fly, and reduce IT infrastructure costs.

Ron Dovich, a Yellowfin partner based in Austin Texas noted that “We choose to run Yellowfin inside of Amazon’s Elastic Compute Cloud platform because our client does not own any hardware or have any in-house expertise for building out and managing the required infrastructure.”

Yellowfin has no plans to offer a SAAS BI application directly to end users. “What we offer is the capability for our partners and OEM partners to develop their own products and services in the cloud using Yellowfin,” says Rabie. The value in Yellowfin is that clients and partners have the flexibility to choose either cloud or traditional in house deployments. "While some BI vendors only work in the cloud, we believe it is important for our customers that we support the two," he said.

www.yellowfinbi.com